Menorca had turned to the Clean Energy for EU Islands Secretariat for support on developing a financing concept for a citizen-owned solar power plant on the island, in the city of Es Castell – a concept supported by the municipality. A first call with the transition team in Menorca helped establish the next steps for advancing the project. The Menorca team then went on to determine the percentage of citizen participation with the municipality. The result: the municipality decided to provide the terrain for the plant, and to open the project up for 100% citizen ownership. Moving forward, this campaign will be supported with a local NGO who will be able to advise on and drive the campaign in the local language together with the transition team.
The conversations with the Menorca team organically touched upon broader ways to support islands in identifying relevant financing sources, including EU-funding. As a consequence, the EU Islands Secretariat compiled an overview of ongoing Horizon2020 calls relevant to islands, which was shared publicly on the Secretariat’s website.